Wasps and Hornets build the paper nests, Yellow Jackets live in the ground. CB 80 or Konk II should work for you. Although if the spray lasted all season it must have been some toxic stuff and could be why you can't find it any more. These two have Pyrethrin from Chrysanthemum flowers which is as good as any megatoxic spray and only affects insects.
I have used a vaccum cleaner hose running from the tail pipe of my car into the holes of Yellow Jackets, with a dirt seal built up around the hose. Do this at night when they're home. Have the car running before you put the pipe in and the fumes will calm them enough to get it in place.
Have you figured out why they like Your deck so much, may if you change the environment they'll stay away.
Good Luck, Ron

Here is a link that might be useful: CB 80

I recently aquired a few decorator birdhouses. I put them out yesterday and already the wasps have found them. Before it is too late, hopefully, how do I stop them from building nests inside these pretty houses?Is there anything I can place inside the houses that the wasps or hornets do not like? The houses are on a wire table on a patio that has southern exposure..it gets very hot and sunny! HELP!
Thanks so much!

Yeap, I use it too. Unbelievable stuff! It's called Real Kill. Black can sprays up to 22 feet and kills those suckers on contact and they won't come back for months.

I couldn't find that this year but they had a yellow can which works just as good. It's more foamy and sprays the same distance.

I had a different view on Bees this year since I saw a ton of them pollinating my cukes. I like them. I just don't like those wasps.

Ok HELP HELP HELP!! I am having a BIG PROBLEM with yellow jackets in bewteen my foundation and cement stairs and in the foundation on the side of the house ...I had sprayed them at night with at least 5 cans of yellow jacket killer and sealed the holes on the side of the house... and I sealed the seam along the area they were coming in and out of behind the stairs .. but apparently there has to be a big nest cause it is now April and we have had a couple of warm days here in Chicago and I have seen them on my stairs and the other day there was one in my basement ** alive mind you ** of course I killed it but I am not liking the fact I didn't get rid of them last year!And its sooo early in the year for them to be out! Since I can not get to the nest to get it out, what can I do to get rid of them??? I will be spraying it all over again and sealing ANY openings between the foundation & stairs under the siding and the house etc..And I have checked every possible opening they could possibly get into my basement inside my basement ** had tons of them last year in the basement too** I am short of calling Orkin or whomever did not need that kind of expense right now ....any ideas are very helpful thank you !!! :)

Orkin or another professional will be able to get rid of the nest with less hazardous results than you spraying all over the place. I suspect that because of the location of this nest that there are multiple queens and that they are reinhabiting the same location year after year. This phenomenon occurs in the south sometimes, resulting in yellow jacket nests with enormous populations.

This needs to be taken care of efficiently and with the safety of the human residents in mind! Call some pest control companies and talk to them.

Is there anything I can do to stop yellow jackets from feeding on my humming bird feeders. These pesky critters run off my humming birds? I don't want to harm the hummers.

Hello,

I recently moved into a rental that has a big, wonderful deck with stairs down to the garden. This is how my dog goes outside. We had plenty of wasps and bees around through the spring, and we all ignored them, and they ignored us. Then a couple of weeks ago, my dog and daughter were both stung, so I went under the deck with spray and destroyed 3 nests.

Thinking we were in the clear, life went back to normal. But the survivors kept circling around, and I had to spray again, as they seemed to be rebuilding under the stairs. The dog and I were stung one day for no reason (except being on the stairs.) Now, it seems that every other day there are wasps going in & out between the boards on the steps.

I will spray as often as I have to, but I'd really love to figure out how to keep them out of the stairs. I have been stung 3 times so far, and each time I was minding my own business. As someone who gardened peacefully for 20 years without being stung by anything, I deeply resent this!

The house is old, so everything is holey and crumbly. And I dont' want to spend too much money on this, as I hope to move out this winter. But I don't want the wasps to ruin the rest of our summer!

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!

Ann in Virginia

I have recently seen many wasps flying around the plants on my balcony, first time in 30 years. I can't even get close enough to water them, so early this morning I sprayed the areas near them with Clorox clean-up, and actually sprayed the bottom of the plants with Orange dawn mixed with water. I had hear that insects do not like the smell of the orange liquid, and for now, this morning, the wasps and bees are gone!

Several years ago I had the same problem with yellow jackets and the hummingbird feeders. I learned that the yellow jackets like orange juice better than the hummingbird juice. Placed a bowl of ornange juice on the porch and they left the feeders and drowned in the OJ. I got thirty or 40 the first day. soon there were none around the feeders.

I will try the orange juice idea, countrygirl. I am in southern Westchester outside of NYC, and we haven't had too many bees and wasps until this year. However, we have not had one stink bug this year, so I guess I could consider myself lucky. I have also heard that they don't like the smell of eucalyptus leaves, so I bought some and put them next to the flower boxes, and some of the wasps went away, except for three very stubborn ones. They stay in the flowers, so as long as they don't come after us, I guess I can live with it, but I wish they would leave already.

I am confused. I know not to kill the bees...but go ahead and kill the Yellow jackets? Do they have any positive purpose? There are a ton (like HUNDREDS) down in a hole in the concrete under my deck support. From Internet pics I am pretty sure they are yellow jackets...bright yellow, smooth bodies. I was going to try to get them out w/o killing but if they aren't beneficial in any way...

Hi Kim.

I live on the ninth floor of a high rise building, and really have had no other insects or pests here, so the wasps are of no purpose to me except for annoyance that I can't even go out on my terrace to water my plants without being chased by a number of them. I think they were attracted to a new guinea impatiens plant that was given to me as a gift, and now they are all over the place. I sprayed bleach and orange dawn in the area, and it kept the numbers down, but then it rained, and now they are back in large numbers. Is it possible that they have a nest in one of my planter boxes? Because there is no other place here where they could have a nest, it's all concrete and brick.

It's really getting to be a problem, to the point where we cannot even use our terrace anymore. Any other suggestions would be very much appreciated.

More than likely those wasps have a nest in one of your planters, and there must be a food source (insects, sugars) or they would not stay around.

Bleach will not be of much use, nor will Dawn, orange or green, or blue. First, try to locate the nest, that will be where most of them congregate. Depending on where the entrance hole is located you could try pyrethrin dusts around that area so the incoming workers would have to walk through that dust and take some down into the nest where it will, eventually, kill those in the nest.

kimmq is kimmsr

Thank you, I will try the pyrethrin dust. Too scared of them to try and find the nest. No food out there, ever, so it must be the flowers or other insects. They do stay away from the bleach and orange dawn, though, but the minute it rains, it washes the spray away, and they come back. Right now we sprayed this morning, all around the concrete near the planters, and not one of them is there. I can't wait to throw these plants out already, much as I love them, they've got to go. Next year, geraniums and marigolds only.